![[VR] Mad Life Crisis](https://forums-cdn.zaonce.net/data/avatars/m/232/232989.jpg?1592151565){kind=avatar}
Infinity vs insignificance and all that. Also the video contained some Elite Dangerous footage (@02:47).
Source: https://youtu.be/AEgXF1LXHnM
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General / Off-Topic Fear Not Your Insignificance
- Thread starter [VR] Mad Life Crisis
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I'm not afraid of it. I've learned to accept and embrace it. Feeling that we are just a speck of dust in an unimaginable vastness of the Universe. At first the thought of it is terrifying, but the more you think about it the more beautiful it is.
I just assume that every individual perspective the most significant one, from it's own perspective. Your universe is as large as you can conceive of and lasts as long as you do. The idea that it will carry on without you, that you are an insignificant part of something larger than yourself, may be both obvious and rational, but it's still an abstraction and ultimately unknowable. The vastness of the universe we can perceive, and the thought of what more may be out there, is hardly a convincing argument against a solipsistic outlook.
I find that the immensity of the universe and our insignificance can help to accept the idea of the death more easily.
In front of the insurmountable and our extreme weakness in front of this gigantism, the death can even become a kind of deliverance.
I feel this when I'm tired of my dust condition or when I try to represent what the universe is and the time also.
In front of the insurmountable and our extreme weakness in front of this gigantism, the death can even become a kind of deliverance.
I feel this when I'm tired of my dust condition or when I try to represent what the universe is and the time also.
I think, therefore; I am: Even that could be argued against on the level of ownership of awareness, because we can not be sure that we haven't just come into existence with our memories just recently installed. This post could be in your imagination, so if you authored it, where is the argument?
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Quantum Foam?
I could only view half of the video because of its seeming intolerance of "God", "faith", and anything not understandable via current "scientific hypothesis".
The scientific method may currently be our best tool for understanding what most think is the objective universe. However it shouldn't preclude that other equally valid ways of perception may exist.
Science and technology have improved our lives immensely. Yet despite the comfort and leisure some of us are lucky enough to experience, the amount of human anguish and suffering has not declined accordingly.
People talk of travelling the cosmos yet people are still begging for food on the streets.
I truly do appreciate the immense scale of the universe from the quantum particle to the galactic cluster. But it seems to me that the altruistic love beings have for each other is infinitely more valuable. And more worth "knowing".
The scientific method may currently be our best tool for understanding what most think is the objective universe. However it shouldn't preclude that other equally valid ways of perception may exist.
Science and technology have improved our lives immensely. Yet despite the comfort and leisure some of us are lucky enough to experience, the amount of human anguish and suffering has not declined accordingly.
People talk of travelling the cosmos yet people are still begging for food on the streets.
I truly do appreciate the immense scale of the universe from the quantum particle to the galactic cluster. But it seems to me that the altruistic love beings have for each other is infinitely more valuable. And more worth "knowing".
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So true, and so well said.
![[PS4] Lorenzo Waringos](https://forums-cdn.zaonce.net/data/avatars/m/234/234580.jpg?1612617334){kind=avatar}
I adore the insignificance, it is so freeing. It’s the ones that truly believe in our significance, that want to cover everyone in their game of responsibility, meaningfulness and order that are terrified.
The atheist/religion thing feeds into this. Both have deep held beliefs, they need to believe something, either the existence or non existence of God. No human can prove, therefore know, the existence of God or not, so it is a belief. It is the fear of not knowing that is the same as the fear of insignificance. Only the agnostic admits they don’t know and can live with that uncertainty.
Uncertainty and insignificance. The best UI.
so true.
Knowing how alone we are, how limited the resources are, and how vulnerable the little speck is has greatly increased my compassion for my fellow travellers.
Surprisingly, this perspective isnt universally shared by Elite players.
-Carl Sagan
Magnificent !
"For a few minutes standing in the darkness, I realised I could see my hand quite clearly. Something I’d noticed that I could not do, on previous nights. So I looked up, expecting to see the glow of the full moon. But the moon was no where in sight. Instead, there was a long glowing cloud, directly overhead. The Romans called it the ‘via galactica’, the road of milk. Today, we call it the Milky Way.
Seeing is only far from it. That night, years ago, I knew a small part of what’s out there … the kinds of things, the scale of things, the age of things. The violence and destruction … appalling energy … hopeless gravity … and the despair of distance. But I feel safe. Because I know my world is protected by the very distance that others fear. It’s like the universe screams in your face: “Do you know what I am, how grand I am, how old I am? Can you even comprehend what I am? What are you … compared to me?” And when you know enough Science, you can just smile and look at the universe and reply: ‘Dude, I am you.’
When I looked at the galaxy that night, I knew that the faintest twinkle of starlight was a real connection, between my comprehending eye, along a narrow beam of light, to the surface of another sun. The photons my eyes detect, the light I see, the energy in which my nerves interact … came from that star! I thought I could never touch it, yet something from it, crosses the void … and touches me. I might never have known. My eyes … saw only a tiny point of light, but my mind saw so much more. I see the invisible bursts of gamma radiation from giant stars, converted into pure energy by their own mass. The flashes that flash, from the far side of the universe, long before Earth had even formed. I can see the invisible microwave glow of the background radiation left over from the Big Bang.
I see stars drifting aimlessly … at hundreds of kilometres per second, and the space-time curving around them. I can even see millions of years into the future. That blue twinkle will blow up one day … sterilising any, nearby solar systems, in an apocalypse that makes the wrath of human gods seem pitiful, by comparison. Yet it was from such destruction … that I was formed. Stars must die … so that I can live. I … stepped out the supernova … and so did you."
Seeing is only far from it. That night, years ago, I knew a small part of what’s out there … the kinds of things, the scale of things, the age of things. The violence and destruction … appalling energy … hopeless gravity … and the despair of distance. But I feel safe. Because I know my world is protected by the very distance that others fear. It’s like the universe screams in your face: “Do you know what I am, how grand I am, how old I am? Can you even comprehend what I am? What are you … compared to me?” And when you know enough Science, you can just smile and look at the universe and reply: ‘Dude, I am you.’
When I looked at the galaxy that night, I knew that the faintest twinkle of starlight was a real connection, between my comprehending eye, along a narrow beam of light, to the surface of another sun. The photons my eyes detect, the light I see, the energy in which my nerves interact … came from that star! I thought I could never touch it, yet something from it, crosses the void … and touches me. I might never have known. My eyes … saw only a tiny point of light, but my mind saw so much more. I see the invisible bursts of gamma radiation from giant stars, converted into pure energy by their own mass. The flashes that flash, from the far side of the universe, long before Earth had even formed. I can see the invisible microwave glow of the background radiation left over from the Big Bang.
I see stars drifting aimlessly … at hundreds of kilometres per second, and the space-time curving around them. I can even see millions of years into the future. That blue twinkle will blow up one day … sterilising any, nearby solar systems, in an apocalypse that makes the wrath of human gods seem pitiful, by comparison. Yet it was from such destruction … that I was formed. Stars must die … so that I can live. I … stepped out the supernova … and so did you."